About us

Attendance dates for the Summer Meditation Intensive have changed – we are now asking participants to register and attend a week at a time, in full. Each separate week is a retreat within the Month-Long Meditative Container. If you would like to attend more than one consecutive week, please register for both weeks and you can experience a continuous retreat.

Week 1

July 1-6: Resilience Through the Life Story of the Buddha (this week has been cancelled)

Week 2

July 7-13: Heart Cultivation: Slogan Practice and Tonglen

**Registration is now closed**

Live-Streaming registration is now closed

Lama Willa, Lopon Liz, & Camille Hykes:

The second week of the July month-long Practice Intensive will focus on the teachings and practices of Heart Cultivation (Lojong). Heart Cultivation, a lineage that derives from the teachings of Atisha, emphasizes that every moment of our lives can be practice. We will explore how difficult states and obstacles are especially welcome opportunities for transformation. Textual study sessions will focus on Shantideva’s Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life (Bodhicaryavatara)and Jamgon Kongtrul’s The Great Path of Awakening. Retreatants are requested to purchase and bring these books with them. A practice interview with Lama Willa or Lopon Liz is guaranteed. Interviews are scheduled at time of check-in, not before.

Week 2 Special Event(open to the public!): July 8, 4-5pm Bodhisattva Vow Ceremony

How is Vajrayana Buddhism a path of compassion? In this week-long intensive, we will explore different dimensions of the vibrant tradition of the Vajrayana as a path of compassion, the branch of Buddhism extending from the Himalayan Regions of South Asia. We will explore some of the Vajrayana’s key features, such as:

Reverence, as a stance of profound appreciation and willingness to be transformed by the power of sacred view, meditation, and action.

Generating wholesomeness, the practices of arising, dissolving, and resting in our own inherent nature.

Outer, inner, secret, and innermost secret retreat. How to create the conditions for engaging in sacred world, whether we are practicing being in retreat with a group, alone, or in our daily lives.

How the Vajrayana cultivates relationship and the interpersonal through connecting with the lineage.

Some teachings & study of Creation and Completion.

A practice interview with Lama Willa or Lopon Liz is guaranteed. Interviews are scheduled at time of check-in, not before.

Week 3 Special Event(open to the public!): July 15, 4-6pm Vajrasattva Empowerment and Transmission

Event Highlights

About the
Venue and Teachers

Wonderwell Mountain Refuge is a sanctuary dedicated to the cultivation of mindfulness, wisdom, and compassion. Through the transmission and preservation of authentic and ancient lineage teachings, visitors discover how the depth and profundity of these teachings are relevant to contemporary life. Located on twenty-five acres of rolling hills in Springfield, New Hampshire, Wonderwell was originally built as a summer home in 1911.Tranquil and serene, surrounded by woods, meadows, gardens, and century-old stone walls, Wonderwell’s stately main building offers a comfortable and spacious setting in which the transformative potential of meditation—for work, community and daily life—can be explored and realized. Recently, due to its many unique features, the building has been recognized as a New Hampshire state historic site.Since its founding in 2011 as a Buddhist retreat center dedicated to the cultivation of mindfulness, wisdom, and compassion for a better world, Wonderwell Mountain Refuge has provided a sanctuary for the transmission and preservation of authentic and ancient lineage teachings, as well as for the rediscovery of these teachings as profoundly relevant to contemporary life. Wonderwell Mountain Refuge is owned and operated by Natural Dharma Fellowship, a non-profit 501c3 organization dedicated to the preservation of the teachings of the Buddhadharma in the West. While grounded in the practices and teachings of the Buddhist tradition, Natural Dharma Fellowship’s mission is enhanced by retreats at Wonderwell that explore the realms of contemplative care, social justice, secular ethics, and activism.Over the first six years of operation, Wonderwell hosted over 100 residential group retreats supported by dedicated staff and guided by experienced meditation teachers. The types of retreats hosted include:Silent group retreats to deepen in meditation practice, to steep in the timeless wisdom of the Buddhist teachings, and to cultivate the heart of compassion.Contemplative retreats for activists, educators, care-givers, artists, writers, couples, and families.Gatherings dedicated to exploring the intersection of Buddhist ethics with ecological sustainability.Yoga and mindful movement retreats.Events for local communities in and around Springfield, New Hampshire.At present, Natural Dharma Fellowship’s vision, and the programming and development of Wonderwell, are stewarded by Willa B. Miller, PhD, Founder and Spiritual Director of Natural Dharma Fellowship and Elizabeth Monson, PhD, Spiritual Co-Director of Natural Dharma Fellowship and the Managing Teacher at Wonderwell.Both are fully authorized teachers within the Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism and are trained scholars of the Buddhist traditions and translators (Tibetan-English). Their work is supported by a community of over 30 meditation teachers, visiting teachers and mentors, who participate in creating a web of support for students who participate in Wonderwell’s retreats and trainings.

Anastra is a meditation teacher with Natural Dharma Fellowship. She has been a practicing Buddhist since 2002 originally affiliated with the Triratna Buddhist Community, a worldwide international fellowship of Buddhists. In 2008, Anastra was ordained and received in the Triratna Buddhist Order. Anastra’s growing interest in Dzogchen and Mahamudra eventually drew her to Wonderwell/NDF and the diversity of Tibetan teachings and retreats offered there. Anastra has been engaged for the past six years in the Margha program, the last three in a teaching capacity as Mitra. With a Master’s and Doctorate in Psychology, and Clinical Pastoral Education 2-year training in geriatric spirituality, Anastra has been working for the past 12 years as a Resident Service Coordinator in HUD subsidized housing for seniors in independent living. Anastra loves working with this population. From them she has learned how the aging process may be viewed as a powerful catalyst for realizing one’s innate spiritual essence and for highlighting impermanence as a dynamic, elegant force for transformation.

NDF Meditation Teacher Kathe was one of the founders of Haley House in 1966 when she and her husband welcomed men who were homeless into their apartment. For the next 42 years she merged her background in Christian contemplation with service. In the 80s she walked for peace and chanted with the Nipponzan Myohoji monks and nuns. She was introduced to Dzogchen by Sogyal Rinpoche and became a student of Lama Surya Das under whose guidance she went on a 100 day Wisdom retreat. It is Tibetan Buddhism with its practices that turn poison into medicine – in oneself and in the world – that is her path.

NDF Meditation Teacher Bob is a writer living in the Boston area. Since meeting the late Nyoshul Khenpo Rinpoche in 1994, he has studied and practiced the Dzogchen teachings of Tibetan Buddhism, primarily with his main teachers: Lama Surya Das, Lama John Makransky, Lama Willa Miller, Charles Genoud, Brendan Kennedy and Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche. As a meditation teacher with Natural Dharma Fellowship since its founding, he co-directs (with Camille Hykes) NDF’s margha program, which offers year-long trainings in natural meditation and bodhicitta practices.He is also a guiding teacher with Foundation for Active Compassion, sharing the Innate Love and Wisdom practices developed by Lama John Makransky, as well as host of NDF’s and FAC’s Green Tara sadhana practice group. As an avid hiker, his special interests include the awakening power of nature and, as a cancer survivor, helping others embrace the challenges of cancer as spiritual opportunities.

NDF Meditation Teacher Camille Hykes has practiced and studied in the Nyingma and Kagyu traditions of Tibetan Buddhism since 1995. Intensive solitary and group retreats, including 100-day retreats, have helped to fuel her practice. Direct experience of the sacred nature of the Earth illumines the indwelling openness of our hearts, and such teaching has also been of the essence for Camille.She is a student of the Diamond Approach, an open-ended path of inquiry into the immediacy of our personal experience. Gesture of Awareness, a unique means of exploring our essential nature through the body, has been vital for her, too, and she is authorized to teach this way of engaging life in the present. As a meditation teacher with Natural Dharma Fellowship since its founding, she co-directs (with Bob Morrison) NDF’s margha program, which offers year-long training in natural meditation and bodhicitta practices. In her capacity as a book editor, Camille has worked closely with such teachers of the Dharma as Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo and Charles Genoud, as well as many literary writers of distinction for over twenty years.

Brendan Kennedy has been practicing Tibetan Buddhism for over 30 years. His main teachers are: His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Dilgo Khyentse Rimpoche, Chatral Rimpoche, Sokste Rimpoche and Lama Surya Das. Drawing on his deep study of Ramana Maharishi and Nisagardatta Maharaji, Brendan illuminates the complementary similarities between Dzogchen and Avaita Vedanta through experiential teaching. Brendan gives a few intensive retreats each year, but primarily focuses on synthesizing theory and practice at his desert hermitage in California.

Lama Karma Chötso began her study and practice of Tibetan Buddhism in 1982 when the fully enlightened master Kalu Rinpoche bestowed the Kalachakra Empowerment in New York City. She was fortunate enough to continue to take teachings and empowerments from Kalu Rinpoche, who ordained her as a novice Buddhist nun in 1986 prior to her entering the traditional three-year, three-month retreat at Kagyu Thubten Chöling Monastery/Retreat in upstate New York. The retreat, held in strict seclusion, was guided by Lama Norlha Rinpoche, one of the great meditation masters of the Kagyu lineage, and was completed in 1990. After that, Lama Chötso added to her training by learning Tibetan painting, traveling to Asia twice on pilgrimage and living in Nepal for a while to study and practice there. She then returned to KTC in America. Late in 1996, Lama Karma Chötso came to South Florida to prepare for Lama Norlha Rinpoche, Abbot of KTC, to visit and teach in Hollywood. At the end of his teachings, Rinpoche instructed her to stay in Florida and begin teaching. When Rinpoche returned a year later, a little house had been rented in Hollywood, a shrine room set up, and many students were waiting for him. Rinpoche…

John Makransky, PhD has practiced meditations of compassion and wisdom from Tibetan Buddhism for 30 years and has pioneered new ways of taking them into the worlds of social service and social justice by making them accessible to people of all backgrounds and faiths. A professor of Buddhism and Comparative Theology at Boston College, John is also a senior advisor to Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche’s Centre for Buddhist Studies in Nepal, affiliated with Kathmandu University and Rangjung Yeshe Institute. In 2000, John was ordained a Tibetan Buddhist lama in the lineage of Nyoshul Khenpo and Lama Surya Das. As a meditation teacher at retreats across the U.S., John became known for guiding participants in their discovery of innate wisdom and love. He is the guiding meditation teacher of the Foundation for Active Compassion, Courage of Care, and the author of Awakening through Love: Unveiling Your Deepest Goodness.

Dharma Lopon and Spiritual Co-Director of Natural Dharma Fellowship Managing Teacher of Wonderwell Mountain Refuge Elizabeth Monson, PhD, is the Spiritual Co-Director of Natural Dharma Fellowship and the Managing Teacher at Wonderwell Mountain Refuge. She has been studying, practicing and teaching Tibetan Buddhism in the Kagyu and Nyingma lineages for over twenty-five years. She has studied with Pema Chodron, Tulku Orgyen Rinpoche, Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche, Trungpa Rinpoche, Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche, Gyalse Tendzin Rabgye and others. Elizabeth is interested in accessing the energy and open awareness found in the natural world for awakening in everyday life. She also focuses her teaching on developing practical methods for incorporating the Buddhist teachings into this human life through the practices of kindness and compassion and on recognizing the natural state in every moment of our lives. These days she derives inspiration from the teachings of Anam Thupten, Tsoknyi Rinpoche, and Lama John Makransky. Elizabeth holds a PhD in the Study of Religion from Harvard University with foci in Buddhist Studies, Tibetan Buddhism, and ethics. Her research interests include the ways in which Himalayan Buddhist biographical, autobiographical, narrative, poetic, and meditative literature work to provide a space for meditation on what it means to…

Founding Teacher and Spiritual Director of NDF and Wonderwell Mountain Refuge Willa B. Miller, PhD is the Founder and Spiritual Director of Natural Dharma Fellowship in Boston, MA and its retreat center Wonderwell Mountain Refuge in Springfield, NH. She was authorized as a dharma teacher and lineage holder (lama) in the Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism after completion of two consecutive three-year retreats in the nineties. She has also practiced in the Shangpa and Nyingma lineages. She is editor, author and translator (respectively) of three books: The Arts of Contemplative Care: Pioneering Voices in Buddhist Chaplaincy and Pastoral Work (2012), Everyday Dharma: Seven Weeks to Finding the Buddha in You (2009), and Essence of Ambrosia (2005). In 2013, she received a doctorate from Harvard University in Religion, and is currently Visiting Lecturer in Buddhist Ministry at Harvard Divinity School. Her academic teaching interests include Tantra and the Body, Buddhism and Ecology, and Buddhist Contemplative Care, among other topics. Outside of academia, her teaching specialties include the body as a door to awakening, natural meditation (mahamudra), and heart-cultivation (lojong). She is interested in the practical integration of meditation into daily life, and has participated as an advisor in several scientific studies on meditation. Her teachers and guides have included Kalu Rinpoche,…

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